


i am the boy with the painted face (i am loved)

by suganii (feints)



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Gen, Getting Together, Graduation, Gratuitous use of metaphors, M/M, Proposals, it starts and ends with a proposal but it doesn't happen exactly like you'd expect, matsuoi: 'how do you love a star?' edition
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-14
Updated: 2021-01-14
Packaged: 2021-03-12 08:27:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28757334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feints/pseuds/suganii
Summary: Oikawa is starlight and sapphire skies, and Matsukawa could look at a thousand nights and find him in every single one.
Relationships: Matsukawa Issei/Oikawa Tooru
Comments: 5
Kudos: 36





	i am the boy with the painted face (i am loved)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AnimeGinaLinetti](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnimeGinaLinetti/gifts).



> i am so happy to finally gift this to you because i've been sitting on it since last saturday & i really hope you enjoy it!!! love you, and thank you so much as always for your support <3

It starts out as a joke. Matsukawa doesn’t think Hanamaki means anything by it—doesn’t know how big Matsukawa’s crush has grown by the time he’s dared Matsukawa to ask Oikawa out. It’s just usual harmless ribbing, a throwaway line to be discarded and forgotten, except, well.

Except it doesn’t leave Matsukawa’s mind. The _ease_ of it all, the _casualness._

It could mean nothing, if he wanted it to. Which is why Matsukawa does it.

Walking home from practice one day with Oikawa hanging behind for once—probably thinking up new volleyball plays in his head, his passion has always impressed Matsukawa—Matsukawa’s eyes fall on the boy’s shadow beside him, bobbing up and down on the sidewalk in little waves. An idea strikes, and bending down, he plucks off a few blades of grass, then slows his pace until he’s matched up with Oikawa.

Oikawa raises an eyebrow at him in askance, gives him a friendly, “Need something, Mattsun?” but otherwise says nothing.

Matsukawa rubs a sweating hand discreetly on his high school trousers and takes a breath, before stepping in front of Oikawa and forcing him to stop. He clears his throat, holding out the blades of grass in his palm.

In an idyllic world, his words would come out as he intended. “ _Oikawa Tooru, if you go out on a date with me, I promise to surround you with a field of flowers._ ” He imagines there’d be a laugh, Oikawa perhaps saying yes. Matsukawa letting the blades of grass—simple, transient things—flutter to the ground if he says no.

What actually comes out of Matsukawa’s mouth though is: “Oikawa Tooru, if you marry me, I promise to surround you with a field of flowers.”

Oikawa glances up at him, the back of his head catching flame, all the rage of a mid-afternoon sun behind him. For a moment, Matsukawa wishes for the light to blind him so he’ll no longer have to be witness to his own humiliation, to the death sentence he’s handed himself with a slip of his own tongue.

There is a devastating, consuming silence, the hush of a supernova as Matsukawa contemplates the unfairness of the earth for not opening beneath him to swallow him whole. Behind him, Hanamaki and Iwaizumi’s eyes bore like brands onto his back, but Matsukawa’s feet are rooted to the earth.

His eyes are only fixed on Oikawa. Oikawa, who’s turning fifty alarming shades of sunburn, cheeks flushing apple-red while his eyes flash and narrow, predator-sharp, gauging Matsukawa for weaknesses and picking the pieces of him apart down to bone. Matsukawa’s never been told he’s an open book but all the same, he freezes, not quite sure which of his emotions are doing the talking for him, displayed on his face.

This is _Oikawa Tooru_ he’s talking about, Oikawa who can dissect a stranger within minutes, friends in less than that. Matsukawa’s heart beats like a war drum in his chest.

And then Oikawa blinks, the spell broken as his smile splits his face open wide. He prowls forward, laying a hand on Matsukawa’s shoulder, and purrs. “Ah, Mattsun, I’m flattered, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves, shall we? Maybe a date first?”

The words chime in Matsukawa’s head like bells, tinkling and silvery, sugary-sweet as Oikawa’s usual cadence is, but his cheeks are still tinted, and his eyes hold a shadow over them, and Matsukawa thinks he hears the faint thrum of a song in his ears.

“Yes, yes, okay,” he says.

Oikawa turns the prettiest shade Matsukawa’s ever seen. And Matsukawa realises he could never have done casual. Not with him.

・🎕・

One date turns into two turns into four turns into eight. Matsukawa makes promises of marriage while Oikawa chortles and Oikawa, pleased, stammering, blushing, accepts them as his due.

Dating Oikawa is a bit like playing volleyball, Matsukawa learns. In that heartbeat after the first whistle blows, and you’re positioning yourself for the first serve, you never feel more present: the sound of your own breathing to your own ears, the cold air brushing against your bare knees, the slight itchiness of your socks. The sound of a hard slap of a palm on a ball, the awareness of your teammates on the periphery. And then, release: the ball hitting the ground. Or, if you’re prepared, hitting your forearms.

Dating Oikawa, Matsukawa has never felt so seen. Every moment with him can be crystallised into a photo album-worthy memory, and Matsukawa feels like he’s caught up in a whirlwind. For now, this impossibility, of this impossible boy in his arms; feeling more alive with atoms than can be contained in human skin and a hunger that threatens to devour whole galaxies, Oikawa is starlight and sapphire skies, and Matsukawa could look at a thousand nights and find him in every single one.

It feels like it’s buzzing just underneath his skin, a feeling more than he can express in words where Oikawa is living in between every pleasing note, every string of his retired bow. Matsukawa doesn’t know how long he can hold onto this, hold onto Oikawa. It thrills and scares him in equal measure.

So the leaves turn and fall and snow coats the ground, and the world revolves. In a perfect orbit around the only star in their galaxy, the earth continues to shift beneath them as Matsukawa takes Oikawa to a museum, and Oikawa takes Matsukawa to the movies, and Aoba Johsai loses, and loses, and loses.

One day, Matsukawa buys a gacha for Oikawa. Asks Oikawa to hold out his hand and close his eyes, while Matsukawa deposits the treasure in his hand. Oikawa’s fingers close over the capsule with a frown between his brows, and it only eases when he understands. “Why, a gacha? For me, Mattsun, how romantic!”

He cracks open the capsule easily to reveal a keychain of a blue-striped spaceship falling onto his palm, the underside of the spaceship painted a bright white. Oikawa fingers the keychain with a grin, and Matsukawa thinks he sees the ship reflected in the gleam of his eyes, a swirl of blue and white and brown. “Hee, Mattsun, you really didn’t have to.”

“Oikawa—” At his boyfriend’s pout, Matsukawa quickly corrects himself. “Tooru.”

Oikawa’s eyes soften as Matsukawa continues, clearing his throat. His heart twinges. “You know, I never lose in getting gacha. If you want, I could buy so many more of those keychains. Marry me?”

Oikawa shakes his head in laughter even as Matsukawa ducks down to kiss the grin off his lips. “Mattsun, please. You know I’m too much to be tied down!”

An Oikawaism, according to Hanamaki, is an open secret to all those who know him: one cannot search out an entire universe. One cannot unravel a star. And one cannot completely comprehend Oikawa Tooru.

But Matsukawa thinks he’s starting to. From the programs that Oikawa goes to after school, seeking out his old mentor Jose Blanco and practicing with his club, to studying for the finals and scheduling appointments with the family doctor on weekends. From attending language classes and filling out, turning down local university applications, to everything else in between, Matsukawa makes sure to be there for the process. Oikawa puts his head together with Matsukawa some nights, looking over dietary plans and immigration requirements while Oikawa recites bits of Spanish into Matsukawa’s skin.

Their time together is precious, luminous opportunities and heady stories into the dark, Matsukawa tracing a constellation’s worth of truths and untruths about Oikawa. Learning him.

He knows fully well, skies and stars have never—will never belong to anyone. Matsukawa might no more be able to keep Oikawa than he can keep the reflection of the moon in the water cupped in his hands. But Oikawa is still more than the wanting, the hunger; Matsukawa sees someone who will hold onto him still. And Matsukawa will keep chasing him, for as long as Oikawa will let him.

・🎕・

Matsukawa doesn’t sleep at all through the first night of the new year. At a little past three in the morning he stretches, reaching around Oikawa to fold the papers around him—school documents, travel documents, informational brochures—gathering them into a neat stack which he deposits by the corner of his desk. He takes Oikawa in his arms and deposits him next on Matsukawa’s bed, tucking the covers around him with a sigh. Oikawa latches onto him in his sleep, giving easily in his hold but refusing to relinquish his grip.

Iwaizumi and Hanamaki had already left. In a few hours, they’ll meet up again to pay their new year visits at the shrine, the way they’ve been doing every year since Matsukawa joined the volleyball club.

Matsukawa sits up, wrapping two blankets around himself, and waits for the sun to start weaving its pale gold through the windows, spindly fingers of oranges and reds peeking past the housetops. It chases the darkness away while Matsukawa watches and thinks of colourful Spanish flyers, thinks of the distance between Sendai and Buenos Aires, 18,237 kilometres and a whole ocean in between.

The steps of Osaki Hachimangu Shrine, padded with cobblestone, crunches underfoot as Matsukawa ascends with Oikawa, Hanamaki and Iwaizumi in tow. With the way Oikawa strides through the tori, face covered with a bucket hat, if Matsukawa hadn’t known better, he wouldn’t have guessed his boyfriend had gotten less than three hours of sleep the night before. He suspects he isn’t looking much better, but this matters to Oikawa. Matsukawa links their fingers as they move through the shrine and the roof of black lacquer and gold leaf padding through to the haiden. He finally lets go of Oikawa to throw a coin into the offering box, bowing his head and clapping his hands together as he does. Closing his eyes, he thanks the gods for protecting his family, and prays for good fortune for them, for his former volleyball club, for himself. For Oikawa.

The thoughts cause a lump to form in his throat, and he closes his eyes harder, prays harder. He prays for victory, for Oikawa to seize the world in front of him and conquer. For him to shine brighter without losing himself. And a little selfishly, a little helplessly, he prays that their time together won’t end.

After they pass through the hall, Hanamaki fetches ema votive tablets, and Matsukawa repeats his wish in writing. _Let us be happy, a year, two years, ten years from now._

Matsukawa purchases an amulet for Oikawa at the gate, pressing it into his palm with a kiss. “For luck,” he says. “You know,” he continues, tugging Oikawa close, “if you marry me, I will pray for luck for you every day. Kiss it into your brows every morning, and whisper it onto your lips every night.”

“Such a charmer, Mattsun,” Oikawa teases, waggling his eyebrows, but his cheeks are once again coloured a rosy red, to Matsukawa’s satisfaction. “But I think you’re all the luck I’ll ever need.”

The words stab at Matsukawa’s chest. It makes Matsukawa wonder if it can be true—does Oikawa need him?

Would it be possible after all, for Oikawa to bring a piece of Matsukawa with him when he leaves?

・🎕・

It’s snowing again. Matsukawa sets his shoulders against the slight breeze, burrowing slightly deeper into his jacket. Little puffs of air leave his mouth every time he exhales; he tugs his beanie higher over his head, observing swirls of white eddy around him, showering him in snowflakes.

White, he knows, is the colour of purity, of priests. White is the burst of a supernova, a pinprick of light guiding the way in the dark. Matsukawa braces himself, watching as a figure swathed in white jogs toward him, tuft of brown hair giving him away. Matsukawa lifts a hand in greeting, shuffling his feet on the pavement as he waits.

Oikawa doesn’t even stop, launching straight into his arms and almost bowling him over as he affectionately encircles his own arms around him, bumping noses with Matsukawa as their breaths intermingle in the cold.

“How was your run?” Matsukawa asks softly.

The body pressed against him groans. Hot air tickles the hairs on the nape of Matsukawa’s neck as his boyfriend just wraps his arms around him tighter. “ _Mattsunnnnnn._ The weather forecast didn’t say it’d snow today.”

“I believe _I_ told you.”

“Did you?” Oikawa’s face perks up from the shelter of Matsukawa’s jacket, a picture of innocence. He sniffs. “Well, no hell or high water could’ve stopped me from going out today.”

Matsukawa huffs in agreement, acknowledging the truth of his statement before handing Oikawa a coat and beanie he’d brought along just in case. He tugs Oikawa into a konbini. “Two steamed buns, please,” he says.

He presents the steamed bun to Oikawa with a wriggle of the eyebrows. “Tooru, if you marry me, I promise to buy you a lifetime’s worth of steamed buns.”

Oikawa splutters. “Mattsun!”

Matsukawa doesn’t blink. “I’m serious.”

Oikawa doesn’t say anything, but the grip he has on Matsukawa threatens to cut off Matsukawa’s circulation, the way it’s been doing so recently whenever they get remotely close to the topic of discussing their futures. Matsukawa breathes through the tightening in his own chest and rearranges Oikawa’s grip instead so that their fingers interlock.

 _I’m here_ , he wants to say. _I’ll never leave you._

Outside, the snowfall has obscured the sun. Matsukawa tucks their hands into Oikawa’s coat pocket as they walk, listening to Oikawa rant about how Kageyama and Karasuno had made it through day two at the Spring Tournament. When the wind blows, ruffling their joggers, Matsukawa can feel Oikawa in the gust, the energy thrumming under his skin, his fingers twitching, tapping against Matsukawa’s.

Matsukawa imagines Oikawa will run forever if he has to. Through the snow, through the piercing breeze, tufts of brown hair blown into windswept disarray, he’ll keep moving forward, only this time he’ll be leaving Matsukawa behind.

Matsukawa realises, with a burst of shameful clarity, that as much as he must have worried about this, so must Oikawa.

He must know that Matsukawa doesn’t make any random declarations of marriage to just anybody. Matsukawa would follow Oikawa to the ends of the universe, witness the death of its brightest stars if they were together.

But they cannot stay together, not yet, not now. Oikawa is too vast for so small a dream as simply Miyagi, and yet whatever he’s wanted has come to him cursed. He’s chased after shadows for so long; only now is he stepping out into and embracing the light for himself.

“Mattsun,” Oikawa says, suddenly tucking his head under Matsukawa’s chin, completely uncaring of whoever might see. “Mattsun, promise me we’ll be okay?”

“We’ll be okay,” Matsukawa promises.

He means it this time, as much as he’s meant it every single time before.

・🎕・

“Hold out your hand.”

Oikawa eyes him with an easy sort of smile, holding out his hands obediently.

Matsukawa grasps one palm in his own, tracing the calluses with his thumb. So little of him are soft grooves and smooth edges; Oikawa’s hands are rough from years of having handled a volleyball, but still long and fine-fingered. The other boy exhales as Matsukawa draws a finger across his palm lines, straight across, then down in the middle, before lifting his finger lightly to draw another line curving up and in on itself.

Oikawa, for once, stays silent as Matsukawa continues to draw with his finger, another curve down and left and up again, before curving down and out. When he looks up, Oikawa’s brows are slightly furrowed in concentration, but he’s still smiling.

Matsukawa smiles too as he completes the word with straight lines up and then down, before finishing up with a circle. He taps his finger lightly on Oikawa’s palm when he’s done. When he looks up, to his surprise, red is colouring the apples of his boyfriend’s cheeks.

Matsukawa has written a single sentence onto the calluses of Oikawa’s palm.

_Te amo._

_I love you_.

Oikawa swallows, closing his palm and starting to tug it back towards himself.

Matsukawa holds on tight. “Marry me,” he blurts.

If possible, Oikawa colours further. To Matsukawa’s mortification, a tear escapes Oikawa’s eye. “Mattsun, don’t you think you should stop doing this?”

Matsukawa winces, but holds firm. “If you marry me, I will write these cheesy lines into your palm forever.”

Oikawa scoffs, blinking furiously. “You shouldn’t say words you don’t mean.”

Matsukawa finally lets him go, lets Oikawa mutter to himself as he reaches for the drawer under his desk, retrieving a small box out of the drawer and hiding it behind his back.

“Tooru,” he begins, sitting himself back down on the bed, “I have never been dishonest to you.”

“So you’ve wanted to marry me all along?” Oikawa throws the words back like blades, but Matsukawa simply nods.

“Yes.”

He produces the box from his back, opens it to let Oikawa see the ring inside.

Oikawa’s eyes grow wide like saucers, as he immediately shuffles closer. “Mattsun, I… you… _what_?”

He can’t—maybe Matsukawa isn’t capable of a satellite love, that can pierce through rain and sun, and transmit to the stars. He can’t say that he can hold onto Oikawa’s hands forever, not when Oikawa is meant to fly, and Matsukawa is staying.

But Matsukawa will be damned if he doesn’t try. Because the last and best truth he needs to know about Oikawa is this: more than a sky or a star, Oikawa is merely human. And Oikawa wants him too—so if nothing else, Matsukawa will give him this promise.

“I really do want to marry you, Oikawa,” he tells him, firmly, gently. “And it doesn’t matter how long I’ll have to wait—while you go off to Argentina, I just want you to have this. To keep me with you, even when we’re so far apart.”

More than sky and stars, Oikawa is still just a boy. And this boy who falls asleep on Matsukawa’s bed as though he’s always belonged there, who’s accepted Matsukawa’s proposals as his due, who grips Matsukawa tight in sleep as though he never wants to let him go, is Matsukawa’s. His.

For the first time, Oikawa says yes.

**Author's Note:**

> title adapted from mitski's "me and my husband".


End file.
